Why Normal People Aren’t Using AI Agents
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- Josh Miller, CEO of The Browser Company, posted a viral X observation that 'nobody is really using AI Agents,' expressing bewilderment that the general public doesn't care about the tech industry's latest obsession and that 'I just have not heard a single person outside of the tech community talk about an agent that they use.'
- OpenAI said its Codex and ChatGPT Work agents have about 10 million weekly users combined, and people familiar with Anthropic told the outlet its Claude Code and Cowork agents see similar levels of adoption.
- That 10-million-weekly-user agent base is what Miller calls 'basically a rounding error' compared to ChatGPT and Gemini's roughly 1 billion monthly active users each, leaving AI labs with a billion-dollar bet that hasn't yet found a mass-market hook.
- Miller argues AI agents are 'an invented frame made up by our industry to collectively refer to something,' saying tech companies are shipping capability demos — like navigating a website or writing code — rather than products tailored to what customers actually want.
- The Browser Company's most popular feature ever is a personalized morning briefing in its AI-powered browser Dia, which Miller says was technically built on an AI agent but deliberately hides that from users, who get a greeting, a calendar- and email-fed to-do list, and a piece of art.
- Miller says he met with leaders at nearly every top AI lab while exploring acquisition last summer and every one but one cited the 2013 Spike Jonze film Her when articulating their vision, which he offered as evidence of groupthink in the industry.
Why it matters: With AI labs having poured billions into agent capabilities and adoption stuck at roughly 10 million weekly users — versus a billion on mainstream chatbots — the gap exposes a product problem, not a capability one: the industry's flagship bet will only pay off when it stops looking like an 'AI agent' and starts looking like something users actually open their laptops for.
